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Greenfield Energy Park
Greenfield Energy Park is a park that is located in downtown Greenfield, Massachusetts with 18,168 people. This park was once a rundown eye sore to the community but the community took initiative and fought to make it a resourceful, educational, and fun experience for the community. Katherine Kottaridis stated, "The Greenfield Energy Park is a beautiful example of organizing open spaces around the issues of clean energy (Town of Greenfield),” I also interviewed her and she stated, “Greenfield Energy Park is used every weekend for large scale events and hundreds of people show up to enjoy the events.” Prior to 1990, which is when the town of Greenfield created the Master Plan for the town, the park was home to a rundown train station that had been out of commission since and half way demolished since the early 1960’s (Sandy Thomas). This energy park is the revitalization of a piece of important history in downtown Greenfield that was once forgotten by the town’s people but they refused to let it be a pigment of their imaginations for too long. Because the source of any other type of transportation was scarce in the early 1900’s, this train station provided a lot of ways for the towns people to get around. But not only did this train stations bring a source of transportation to Greenfield but it also brought money into the towns in the form of factories, stores, and hotels. The town of Greenfield is made up of 16,123 white people, 297 African-Americans, 239 Asians, and 61 American Indian and Alaska Natives. There are 9,157 females and 8,299 males. Out of the 8,377 homes that are located in Greenfield, Massachusetts there are 7,852 that are currently occupied (2010 Census). Greenfield Energy Park has many different meaning behind its name, the town wanted to focus on energy because they were trying to reenergize the town, so they used Energy because they interpret it as sustainable and renewable energy, people energy, or the energy and spirit of the community. This park was not any ordinary park by any means, this park was used to spark the fire to heat the coal for this town’s revitalization get, and by 1999 this the towns inspiration to revitalize the whole town began. Greenfield Energy Park took nine years to complete, 1990-1999. In 1992 the parks plan became part of the “Strategic Plan for Downtown Greenfield, 1994 there was a development of property spearheaded by Northeast Sustainable Energy Association also known as NESEA, which is Northeast’s leading member organization of professionals working in sustainable energy, whole systems thinking, and clean technology and the town of Greenfield (NESEA). In 1997 phase one of the park was built and constructed and in 1999 the park opened (Town of Greenfield - The Energy Park). Sandy Thomas on the website Projects for Public Space states that Greenfield’s old train station went about 35 years as a rundown train station before the town with the help of Kim Erslv decided to partner with the NESEA, local businesses, schools, foundations, government, Greenfield Garden Club, Greenfield Historical Society, Honor Court, 4-H Club, Kiwanis Club and others, which allowed what we know as today Greenfield Energy Park. Kim Erlsv who is from Greenfield, was attending landscaping school at the University of Massachusetts and was looking for a project locally and she lived two blocks from the old train station (Sandy Thomas). Kim produced the first plan for the park and she wanted to use it from the beginning as a park for energy awareness, entertainment, ecological restoration, for children, and for spillover transportation. Kim Erlsv joined the “Parks Review Team,” that included townspeople, government people, representatives from NESEA, and along with other organizations that dedicated their time and money into this project. There were also volunteers from the community that invested a lot of their time into the project, and because of that the Greenfield community takes a lot pride in Greenfield Energy Park. Kim Erlsv began the revolution for this park but she was backed heavily by the community and the government. Greenfield was very strategic in getting this park constructed. While it is unclear on how much the park cost, there was donations of about $345,000. The community leaders made an agreement with NESEA stating that they could own the building to house their new headquarters for a small fee and if they helped create a community park outside its doors, and in 2008 NESEA transferred the ownership of the park to the town (NESEA). There was also big monetary contribution from ISTEA (Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act), they granted $235,000. There was also was donations given by National Tree Trust of $20,000 for trees and shrubs, and the community engaged in fundraising with the help of companies like Toyota, who donated a Prius car, and allowed the town to raise $90,000 from raffles, to help purchase concrete, steel, and underlying roof structures. And Deerfield Crane Company donated time to put in the pillars, roof, and to top cupola (Sandy Thomas). The parks whole goal was to make sure that it was environmentally sound. The community wanted to make sure that this park was maintenance-free and they did this by adding material to the park that they believed was ecologically-sound and as damage proof as possible. The community leaders decided to use re-used granite curbing that was stocked piled by the Department of Public Work, which made up the center of the amphitheater (Sandy Thomas). They used stone to create the benches, and they came from a local quarry to make the gardens, and sod was used and donated by a local sod farm (Sandy Thomas). The park is a fully supported by the community and they love and utilize it every day, but not only do they use it every day, the community members also volunteer to maintain the park. This park is considered to be revitalized for many reasons but the main reason it is revitalized is because it stayed true to its history. The contractors made sure that they did not just try to take an ugly part of the community and try to make it pretty but they tried to make sure that the town’s history was still out in the open. Project for Public Space writes that the engineers did this by having a caboose from the 1944 with artifacts, vintage photos, renovated office space and pot-belly stove, also by creating museums, the park also contains toy cabooses for the children to play on. The park also contains the normal concepts of a park which are; swings, slides, trails, sitting areas, and animal walking areas. Another aspect of this park that makes it very unique is that it is used for community events such as Annual Mental Health & Wellness Fair, Coops Concerts, and Family Fun Day in the Park (Town of Greenfield). The public art includes local artist that interpreted energy education through their works of art. Gregory Curci produced art work that is placed throughout the park that shows wind power, a solar powered train clock that no longer works, and paintings of trees, flowers and shrubs. And these were put up to educate the community on alternative energy sources and to show the beauty of the environment. The Station, which is the entertainment stage, was built in 2003 for Greenfield’s 250th Anniversary. It was built by volunteers, Kiwanians, and through the raffle that occurred because of Toyota’s donation of a Prius (Sandy Thomas). There was not any political opposition found but there are some signs of political support. “The Renaissance of Greenfield” document shows that Greenfield, Massachusetts political figures had begun getting together a plan to re-energize the Greenfield community by implementing a community vibrancy initiative, because Greenfield had lost it beauty and drive to support local business and the downtown. They wanted to do this by making the community greener by adding solar panels to buildings and remodeling the buildings downtown. Although the article does not mention Greenfield Energy Park, the literature shows that Greenfield political officials was will to support this park because it was green and it brought beauty and hope back to the community. The community’s general reaction to Greenfield Energy Park is awesome. Sandy Thomas stated that the public is very supportive of the park. During lunch hour hundreds of people enjoy their lunch in the park and bring their children to play on the wooden trains. She also stated that park, “brings a flux of people downtown which is what the park was intended to do. However, with the tough economic times the country has faced, we are no different, many people have cut back on extracurricular activities, and there has been a drop in donations for the park this year.” Sandy also mentioned that the most essential lesson that was learned from this project from both the leaders and the community is that to bring the community together one must find a good cause to bring them together, and the town of Greenfield did that by getting the community to donate things to the park such as money and time.